The real Casa de Campo de Miramar is composed of three departments: the
palace, the offices, and the stables and coach-houses. The palace is a
three-storied building, in the style of an English country house. On
the ground-floor, at the entrance, is a spacious central gallery, which
extends nearly the whole length of the palace, dividing it into two
parts. On the right are the king’s study, the library, the oratory, the
reading-room and the dining-room, which is rectangular, and boasts a
magnificent balcony. On the left are the hall, the official reception
rooms, and the billiard-room. Between the study and the library is a
large drawing-room. On the first floor are the apartments of the king
and queen and the old playroom of his Majesty, all communicating with
each other by a terrace which overlooks the sea and the garden. From the
king’s room a tower is reached, which is surmounted by a flag-staff. The
rooms occupied by the royal servants are on the upper floor. A long
gallery connects the main building with the house in which are lodged
the chief officials of the palace, and the stables, which are fashioned
on the most modern English pattern, form a separate building.
Over the principal entrance are three beautifully carved shields: one
with the arms of Spain, another with those of the king, and the third
with those of the queen. In the construction of the palace, the chief
considerations have been comfort and convenience. Every most modern
improvements, both scientific and æsthetic, have been employed to attain
this end. The furniture is elegant, and harmonises perfectly with the
decoration of the rooms; the tapestries, paintings, porcelains, all the
objects of art, in fact, which are found there in great profusion, are
in the most exquisite taste; while the park by which Miramar is
surrounded is probably the best cultivated domain in the possession of
the Crown. The telegraph links up the palace with the whole world; and
the telephone connects it with the royal palace and the Government
Offices at Madrid. At the extremity of the grounds of the Royal
residence, which have been built over the road, and continued to the
water’s edge, is the private landing-stage which his Majesty always uses
in going to and from the _Giralda_. On most days during the San
Sebastian season, the king is to be seen in the Bay, and he is always
one of the most interested spectators of the races during the regatta
week.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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